Ludlow, Colorado BTW #11 - 54 t

BTW  11  #54     Back to the West Journey     Tracks of the StoneBear

Monday July 2, 2012

Ludlow, Colorado    pix are posted now ... and they are good! 

The Ludlow Massacre

You never drink twice from the same stream. 

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6am coffee at Trinidad Lake dawn is pretty good.  Then you drive up I-25 about 16 miles north of Trinidad, Colo... The exit sign to the right just says Ludlow. Plain and undescriptive, just like another interstate exit for a 7 - 11 convenience store. no fanfare. no nothing. There's nothing that says this is anything but another nowhere interstate exit.

Exit.... Turn left / west and go a hundred yards.... the worn out sign says 3/4 mile... paint flakes. go on down the road.

RR tracks off to the right. Up a half mile RR cars sitting still.

Come to a half concrete block building , half covered pavilion. parking lot. stop and look at the displays. UMWA has made this a memorial to the Ludlow massacre. About a dozen plaques in a semi - circle... tells of the history of the coal mining massacre that was here.

Can't believe this was it; this was all???

Now this is a significant place.... the Ludlow massacre was the event that lead to the formation of the UMWA. There are plaques, and monuments to the coal miners struggle.... the events that lead up to the ugly incident of Ludlow. But it was like.... it was not here on this site; it was somewhere close to here. I want to search for the place. The site. I want to see the terrain... The place where this happened.

Got back out on the dirt road.... really washboard dirt road. about 5mph... 10mph would shake your teeth. An suv comes up behind... I pull to the right and flag. I ask the Lady ?is this to the Ludlow monument? I though it was 5 miles down the road? She says keep on driving a few miles and there are some old ruins.

Drive on down at 5 mph. Dirt road is bad wash-boarded.... shakes your teeth to drive..... 15 minutes... come to an old bridge abutment to the right... road crossing hasn't been used in 50 years...

on down the road. begin to come to coal black slag heaps among the scattered pinion pines in the valley. Black tailings dumped out of the mines... the leftover slag ; not coal... not good enough to sell. rock next to the coal seams that got mined out and now thrown away... at the 1st point / dump place outside of the mine. Several black coal heaps / dregs...

No signs, no historical marker.... nothing.  You have to dig to find places like this.

Coal Miners have a special place here at Tracks of the StoneBear. As early as age 6 I remember riding in the back seat of an old junker ford on US hwy 78west from Leeds to Birmingham, Alabama. Down at the bottom of goat hill was a huge black mound.... a mountain in the eyes of a 6 year old. That black slag tailings heap was from the Red Diamond coal mine; there were coal miners here. I knew their families and went to school with their kids and grand-kids. These were hardscrabble families... that somehow survived when that mine closed to avoid going union. And I know guys that still work in the mines.

While walking around this site came upon this Hastings foot-stone.  My god there were even more deaths from tragedy here. Surely this is a place to stop and say a prayer for all those miners, their families, their ancestors.... this date is after the Ludlow massacre.  To see this makes you want to cry.

**** a sidetrack here. Docena, Alabama

There is a small place outside of west Birmingham named Docena. The peonage system in the late 1,800s.... black county jail prisoners sold to the coal mining companies for $2,50 cents a month.... basically slave labor... when they died in the coal mines... they just drug them out and buried them in the coal slag heap.... twelve black prisoners/ miners. 12.... Docena..... Dos = 2.... Docena =12... you understand the meaning? the math? There are Many ugly chapters of the story of the South; we'll speak of more of them in future posts. ****

Back to Ludlow... About 4 miles down and come to the place. There they are.... about 50 beehive dome coking ovens.... lined on a row to the right. About 50 yards to the right is the line of ovens..... open face. 7' high, 15' wide, red brick domes... black carbon coats the bricks inside. I have to get out and walk this.

On the Left / south side of the road there is what's left of old concrete foundation structures... mine HQ? Mine Scales? washing pits... load out terminal... don't know, just the while limestone stanchions and foundation structures that was some ruins now of what was once a bustling mine a hundred years ago.

Ridges on each side of the valley. Mountain forest , pinion pines,... juniper pines... somewhat arid plains as this place is not grown over; it;s still visible. Rock strata layers on the ridges.

 I walk around the ruins for 30 minutes.... say a prayer for all the hard working souls that toiled here in the past. This was a live, living mining camp.... families had settled here after coming across the plains / prairie. The Coal mines... WORK ! ... was here... This was the promised land for some.... it eventually turned into a working hell for many. Enough that they wanted to organize a union and demand better working conditions. Then the coal mining company got the State of Colorado to assist company hired detectives in putting down the union organizers and sent 2 companies of Colorado State National Guard / militia.... to maintain "order".

Eventually, the Colorado National Guard, on the overlooking ridges, fired their rifles on the mining camp. in the aftermath.... some 14 were dead ; 11 of the dead were women and children. Thank you Colorado National Guard! You bastards! You were sworn to protect the state and it's citizens; you turned your rifles on those working citizens.... striking for better than abhorrent working conditions. Nine and ten year old children were working in those mines for ten cents a day.  I hoped you are judged at heavens gate for shooting miners and their families and held accountable.

Walking along the row of some 50+ beehive coking ovens at Ludlow. .... Quiet, sunny... cool, crisp, mountain, Rockies air. Peaceful here,.... today. This place was not on the chamber of commerce scenic places. I walked around here as sacred ground.

A good day !

You never drink twice from the same stream. 

StoneBearTracks Copyright MMXV ALL blog posts and photographs  ALL Rights reserved